Can climate education bring about positive change?

A new World Bank report, Choosing our Future: Education for Climate Action, uses new data and analysis to understand the role education can play in responding to climate change, as well as the challenges climate change poses to education systems. It explores how education can help with ecological transitions by addressing gaps in information, knowledge and skills that hinder climate action, as well as steps countries can take to adapt education systems to a changing climate.

As a new report shows, education plays a key role in tackling climate change. It can combat misinformation and fill gaps in knowledge about climate challenges and solutions, an ongoing problem. For example, only 7 percent of Ugandan 8th grade students can correctly answer a set of 6 basic questions about climate change. Education can solve this. It is the single strongest predictor of climate awareness. Each additional year of schooling increases climate awareness by 8.6 percent, and the effect is greater in higher-quality education systems.

Education also plays an important role in promoting the skills needed for the green transition. Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) skills associated with "traditional" green sectors such as energy are critical, but analysis in the report shows that any job in any sector can become greener with the right skill set. In addition, environmental skills are increasingly in demand across a range of industries. For example, in Brazil, 25 of the % skills required in online job advertisements in the food and beverage industry are green skills such as recycling and waste management. (More on weforum.org)